2013 Korean Grand Prix

Which F1 driver was the best performer during the Korean Grand Prix weekend?

Review how each driver got on below and vote for who impressed you the most during the last race weekend.

Korean Grand Prix driver-by-driver

Red Bull

Sebastian Vettel – Asserted Red Bull’s superiority on Saturday to take his 42nd career pole position. There was no skipping his second run in Q3 this time although it turned out he could have done. He might have come under more pressure from Grosjean had the Safety Car not been deployed, but with clean starts and restarts the result rarely looked in doubt.

Mark Webber – Knowing he had a ten-place grid penalty Webber sacrificed some downforce to improve his straight-line speed for the race. He was a few tenths off Vettel in Q3 which left him 13th on the grid once his sanction was applied. After dodging the Ferrari crash at the start he passed the McLarens, Maldonado and Ricciardo. But Perez’s tyre failure right in front of him forced a third pit stop, and after the restart he was taken out by Sutil.

Ferrari

Fernando Alonso – Made the best of his Ferrari in qualifying to line up fifth but was pessimistic about his race prospects. That turned out to be a realistic assessment as he wasn’t even able to pass Hulkenberg’s Sauber, despite his best efforts. Vied for position with Hamilton at one point and rather generously left the door open at turn four.

Felipe Massa – Lost time in the first practice session with a punctured tyre which had to be replaced. In final practice he was worryingly far off Alonso’s pace on the mediums tyres but got it together in qualifying to line up behind his team mate. He had his Alonso’s quick reaction to thank for the fact his lap one blunder didn’t wipe them both out. Took a while to get past Gutierrez, eventually doing so after Rob Smedley had suggested using all his KERS at the final corner. The Safety Car helped him on his way to recovering two points for ninth.

McLaren

Jenson Button – Believed he would have reached Q3 had he not lost around 0.15s behind Raikkonen, who he had waved past on his out-lap. For the second year running he was blamelessly hit at turn three on the first lap, though the consequences were less severe this time. Despite losing time with a front wing change and another delay when his pit exit light turned red at his second stop, Button took eighth with a long, 33-lap stint on medium tyres, only losing out to Rosberg three laps from home.

Sergio Perez – Pipped Button by three-thousandths of a second in Q2 but also failed to reach the final ten. Passed Maldonado twice in the first part of the race, and the stewards scrutinised his battles with Di Resta and Massa before judging both to be fair. He finished behind the latter, taking the final point.

Lotus

Kimi Raikkonen – Crashed at turn 18 at the end of the first practice session, but his team were able to repair his car quickly enough that his afternoon running was not seriously affected. Still not happy with the performance of the revised tyres in qualifying he could only manage tenth after a messy Q3 lap. Things got better quickly once the race started: he dodged the turn three carnage and passed Ricciardo and Alonso. A slow first stop dropped him behind the latter again but his fortuitously-timed second stop, six laps before the Safety Car appeared, gained him that place plus another on Hulkenberg. Pounced on Grosjean after the first restart to claim second, but never looked like catching Vettel.

Romain Grosjean – Continued his promising showing from Singapore and was quick enough on the medium tyres in Q1 to save a second set of super-soft tyres for the final part of qualifying, which he impressively used to split the Mercedes drivers. Passed Hamilton at the start and was set to pressure Vettel with a short second stint and long third stint before the Safety Car spoiled his plans. Paid the price for making a mistake at Raikkonen, then seems to have somewhat optimistically lobbied his team to try to have the positions reversed. The fact he was rarely within DRS range of Raikkonen at this point rather undermined his claim he was being held up.

Mercedes

Nico Rosberg – Wasn’t happy with his car’s balance in qualifying and was disappointed with the end result of fourth (after Webber’s penalty). He looked happier in the race and was in with a chance of a podium finish when his front wing dramatically failed. Recovered to pass Button for seventh near the end.

Lewis Hamilton – Said after qualifying he felt he’d got everything out of the car to qualify second alongside Vettel. But the race went less well: he lost out to Grosjean early on and was mystified by his loss of pace on medium tyres in the second stint. He was unlucky to have to do another lap after Rosberg first overtook him, then headed pit-wards with a broken wing. Hulkenberg passed Hamilton at the restart, which was unexpected, though he defended well against Alonso. Couldn’t crack the Sauber’s defences for fourth, though.

Sauber

Nico Hulkenberg – Said Q1 and Q2 went “like clockwork” but was surprised to lose four tenths of a second in Q3. His team mate actually made a better start but the turn three incident reversed their fortunes and put Hulkenberg ahead of Alonso. It was a surprise he was able to stay there, never mind pinch another place off Hamilton and keep the Mercedes driver tucked up too.

Esteban Gutierrez – Had a spin on Friday as he acclimatised to a circuit he hadn’t driven on before. Nonetheless he improved on his best qualifying position again with eighth and made a great start, passing Alonso, before losing a lot of time trying to avoid contact at turn three. Couldn’t make his way out of the midfield quickly enough to get into the points – an opportunistic lunge on Maldonado ended up costing him a position to Massa, and Perez knocked him back to 11th.

Force India

Paul di Resta – Made it beyond Q1 despite being held up by Bianchi, but trying to blame the eliminated Marussia driver for his lacklustre showing in Q2 was stretching things a bit. Disliked the car’s handling on medium tyres in the race and when he crashed out there was no ducking responsibility this time: “I have to hold my hands up and apologise to the team,” he said.

Adrian Sutil – Said his Q2 lap was “right on the limit” and was only a tenth of a second off making the cut for the top ten. After picking up front wing damage on the first lap he began to recover but lost control of his car following the Safety Car restart and crashed into Webber. Like his team mate, he also provided the necessary apologies.

Williams

Pastor Maldonado – Tested a new front wing on Friday and was pleased with the results, but didn’t use it on Saturday. He went out in Q1 and vented his displeasure at his team on Twitter, pointing out the improvement Sauber had made since their difficult start to the season. Gained nine places at the start, thanks mostly to Massa’s spin, but was always going to struggle to hang on to them. Trying to run to the end on 32-lap old tyres didn’t work out as he slipped from the points places.

Valtteri Bottas – Used the new front wing on Saturday and out-qualified Maldonado but wasn’t able to get into Q2. He was delayed at turn three at the start but made up places from there, eventually passing his team mate for 12th place.

Toro Rosso

Jean-Eric Vergne – Perplexed by his car on Friday which seemed to get worse as the track conditions improved. Gained a few places at the start but soon found himself at the tail of the midfield. He was set to finish there when a severe handling problem forced him to stop.

Daniel Ricciardo – After a problematic practice he raised his game in qualifying as usual but it wasn’t enough to get the Toro Rosso into Q3. He was the only driver to start on the medium tyres and made it to lap 19 on them. He had a slow pit stop for reasons that aren’t clear, though his team were seen cleaning up the remains of a dead bird afterwards. Oddly he was forced out of the race with a familiar problem, one which also seemed to affect his team mate: “I had the same scenario here last year, when I came down to turn three with a few laps to go, I braked and the car immediately shot to the left. That time it cost me one place. Once I got out of the cockpit this time, I could see there was a mechanical problem at the front left corner.”

Caterham

Charles Pic – Spent Friday practice trying to improve his car’s traction and was still not completely happy with it on Saturday morning. Out-qualified Van der Garde despite catching traffic on his best lap. Collected 14th in the race, one place shy of the 13th the team need to pass Marussia in the constructors’ championship, but earned a ten-place grid penalty for his third reprimand of the year.

Giedo van der Garde – Was happy with his car’s balance in the second practice session but, like his team mate, found the super-softs gave him a lot of understeer. Pic pipped him by a tiny margin in qualifying. A drive-through penalty in the race for forcing Bianchi wide at turn one, which dropped him to last, though he recovered to pass both the Marussias.

Marussia

Jules Bianchi – Rodolfo Gonzalez drove his car in first practice, spinning into the wall early on. In qualifying he was pleased to be closer to the Caterhams but picked up a penalty – and his second reprimand of the season – for holding up Di Resta. Was preoccupied with tyre management during the race and unable to get on terms with the Caterhams. A third reprimand will also see him take a ten-place grid penalty in Japan.

Max Chilton – Said he was “really encouraged” to be close to Bianchi’s pace in qualifying. But like Bianchi he didn’t have the pace to race with the Caterhams.

192 comments on Vote for your 2013 Korean GP driver of the weekend

Hulk all the way! Not only did he pull another great result from his car when he really needs to impress, he managed to defend beautifully against Hamilton and co. One slip up could have easily put him from fourth straight down to eighth but he kept his cool and got the job done. THAT’S what future champions are made of. Come on Lotus, just hire him already!

I think Hulkenberg wouldn’t have been able to finish that high if Sauber hadn’t improved their car. The driver himself acknowledged that the car’s traction was very good. It’s also fair to say that his Q3 lap could have been better.

That said, Nico’s race was great to watch. It is a small wonder that a Sauber managed to stay ahead of Ferrari and Mercedes in the DRS era. It was excellent defensive driving combined with a couple of gutsy passes. It reminded everyone that Hulk truly deserves a winning car and that his first podium is long overdue.

@paeschli Nobody cares about his race afterwards – he finished 9th – yeah big deal in a F138. Not just that, he hampered Alonso’s already ruined start as well. He should be thanking Alonso – if he didn’t have lightning reflexes neither of the Ferraris would have seen the chequered flag.

if he didnâ€™t have lightning reflexes neither of the Ferraris would have seen the chequered flag

You make it sound like Alonso is a god: “OMG, a F1 driver who’s got good reflexes, unbelievable!” …
I think Massa and other people, like me and Ivan here above, cares. We want to see him in F1 next year and he must prove now that he’s got some skills, which he did by finishing in the points after being last at some point. In fact, from lap 2 on, his race was better than Alonso (who could not overtake a Sauber during 20 laps) ; Massa had no problems passing Gutierrez. Also I think that Ferrari cares if they want to finish second in the constructors championship.

I voted before reading the comments, seems most people voted for the Hulk?

I am no Vettel fan by any means but he did his thing again this weekend and was faultless.

Hulkenberg just had the benefit of a car that had amazing traction out and good top speed otherwise he would have finished much further down. Esteban also kept Massa behind him for a long, long time due to the car being set up so well.

Definitely Nico Hulkenberg. That mature and calm drive appeared like he’s had 10 seasons in F1, while in fact it’s only his 3rd season. He is a really talented driver and it’ll be such a shame if he doesn’t get a seat next year.

KiMi’s quali was compromised because of a Broken Front wing. He did a better race then Romain. Romain made a mistake that gave KiMi an opening and he used it well. And romain’s mistake wasnt KiMi’s fault. And begging in the team radio to let him pass KiMi shows the kind of racer he is.

So what, he would have still been miles behind Grosjean had the safety car not intervened. Grosjean definitely deserves more votes than him and it’s just staggering to see how overrated he is… I’ll give you Australia and a few other races but not this one.

That was a reply to the “he was fighting for 8th before that” comment.

As for yours, the safety car did happen. And what happened after it is as relevant as what happened in qualifying. Grosjean made a mistake and Raikkonen was clever enough to take advantage of it. Further, despite racing on fresher tyres, not only could Grosjean not overtake Raikkonen, but he was also rarely within DRS range as the article above points out.

@woshidavid95 Had the safety car not intervened… Had romain not made a mistake.. You can go on with those assumptions as long as you want,but safety car intervened,romain made a mistake. With KiMi behind,he was under tremendous pressure and he chocked,thats the truth. KiMi meanwhile on older tyres just breezed past romain. And even on those fresher rubber never did romain challenge KiMi. Romain might have had a good race by his own standards,but he isnt in the same league as KiMi on race pace. Eveyone knows it.
And yes,romain deserves a lot of votes for his begging in the team radio. Lol…

May I suggest that the poll only involves drivers that achieved something in the grand prix. I mean just the drivers who did something spectacular like gaining many places at the start or producing stunning overtaking maneuver, or defensive moves or having grand chelem etc…
My suggestions for Korean GP would be: Sebastian Vettel for his grand chelem and mistake-free drive, Nico Hulkenberg for his brilliant drive and finish ahead of Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes, Kimi Raikkonen for gaining 8 places in the race, Romain Grosjean for his overall performance especially in the qualifying and Giedo van der Garde for his excellent start gaining 5 places..

@shreyasf1fan Hey that’s great, at least you are not like those other blind fans who try to justify whatever their fav driver does or says… But frankly in this race, Alonso did not seem like his own self, right from the ‘start’…

@noob Yeah, but I don’t see what else he could have done. Korea is anti-clockwise so odd grid positions are at a potential disadvantage because they have to usually turn wide at T1. Plus Massa’s nonsense at T3, was it? And I am still not sure if Alonso’s running too deep into the kerbs at T6 was his fault. It happening every single lap hints at a problem with the car, but who knows. And he had already said a podium will be difficult seeing the long-run pace. So easy to conclude that this wasn’t the F138’s best performance either, but Alonso did have many lock-ups, so not like he was flawless!

@bobby-balboa That is actually a good suggestion, @keithcollantine can we have the names of who voted whom, when all of us do disclose it in the comments. I don’t think anybody would oppose this idea. In this way we can separate the chaff from the grain.

It’s a bit far fetched, but you could make an argument for Mark Webber being DoTW. Outqualified by 3 tenths or so but team admitted trading off some downforce for better overtaking opportunities (due to his 10 place penalty) so may have been comparable with Vettel’s lap. Then he was having a great race, fighting through the field, with a nice little sneak through on Alonso before his puncture and customary mid-race barbeque.

That said, had to vote for Hulkenburg, the only driver finishing way above the car’s potential and keeping the two world champs behind. Vettel was also flawless, Grosjean very good too and unlucky again with safety car.

Shout out to drivers of the fire marshall’s truck and safety car, the only drivers capable of leading Vettel at this stage of the season it seems.